Our gut bacteria alone include over 500 individual species, not only digesting our food but helping ward off infections. Japanese folks can digest the nori around their sushi because they have the right gut bacteria for the job. The efficiency, or inefficiency, of our gut bacteria determines how much nutrition we get from what we eat.

By going after all bacteria (as we've been doing since the days of Dr. Lister) we may actually be helping bad bacteria evolve, creating new "superbugs" like MRSA, which are resistant to antibiotics.

Where you live, what you eat and your species all determine what bacteria help you live, a primate's gut bacteria being notably different from our own. It's thought that controlling the mix of gut bacteria can aid in weight loss.

Nicholson's research has spawned the birth of two new scientific disciplines. Metabolomics studies the chemical products of our metabolism for knowledge on diet, drugs and disease. Metabonomics extends this into the study of other environmental factors.

All this means we have to change our attitude about bacteria. Yes, some induce disease. But some fight it. Some bacteria want to kill us, but others are devoted to helping us live.

A hint of the truth lies in H.G. Wells' novel "The War of the Worlds," (spoiler alert) in which an alien invasion is stopped because the aliens are susceptible to infection by Earth bacteria.

The old joke of people searching for extra-terrestrial life was "we're not alone out there."

Well, we're not alone in here either. And this is dramatically changing the medical science of the 21st century.

Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist since 1978, and has covered technology since 1982. He launched the Interactive Age Daily, the first daily coverage of the Internet to launch with a magazine, in September 1994.

Disclosure

Dana Blankenhorn has been a journalist, writer and part-time futurist for over 30 years.
At the present moment I run only a personal blog in addition to my ZDNet open source blog.
DanaBlankenhorn.Com has the subtitle The War Against Oil. In the past I have used it to write about political history, e-commerce, personal matters, some ideas related to open source, and The World of Always On, which is the idea of using sensors, motes and RFID to turn WiFi links into platforms for applications which live in the air.
My IRA account at Schwab holds a few tech shares, most notably some Intel and Applied Materials, but there are no open source companies in it. I don’t even own any CBS stock.